A new species of Leiopelma frog (Amphibia: Anura: Leiopelmatidae) from the late Pliocene of New Zealand

ABSTRACT

The fossil record of Leiopelma frogs in New Zealand is patchy, with remains previously reported only from the early Miocene (16–19 Mya) and late Quaternary (past 20 Ka). Here we describe Leiopelma bishopi n. sp. from the late Pliocene (3.7–2.4 Ma) of the eastern South Island. The subsequent extinction of frogs in this region is likely due to increased aridity following uplift of the Southern Alps and cooling associated with the Pleistocene Ice Ages. Discoveries from this unique Pliocene terrestrial fossil locality provide new and significant insights into how the dynamic climatic and geological history of Zealandia has shaped the evolution of its recent biota, especially for groups with a poor pre-Quaternary fossil record.

LSID: urn:lsid:zoobank.org:pub:457F4C99-A561-4C3B-802C-3412EA3D7D42

Abbreviations: SVL: snout-vent length; NMNZ: Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa, Wellington, New Zealand; WO: Waitomo Caves Museum, Waitomo, New Zealand

KEYWORDS:

• Amphibia
• Anura
• fossil
• glaciation
• Leiopelma
• Zealandia

Acknowledgements

We thank the collectors of the fossils described in this paper, Trevor Worthy for initially identifying the Waipara fossils as frogs, and Paul Scofield for helpful discussions. We thank Canterbury Museum (Paul Scofield), Waitomo Museum (Celina Yap) and Manaaki Whenua Landcare Research (Jamie Wood) for access to specimens. We also thank Jean-Claude Stahl (NMNZ) for providing images of the Leiopelma material. We acknowledge use of the information contained in the New Zealand Fossil Record File. We are grateful to Clint Easton and Kerry Walton (University of Otago), who provided useful discussions and literature. We thank reviewers Ewan Fordyce (University of Otago) and Dale Roberts (University of Western Australia) for helpful comments that greatly improved this manuscript. Lastly, a huge thanks goes to the late Professor Phil Bishop, who supported L.J.E. as his academic supervisor throughout his studies at the University of Otago, including the earlier stages of this work. Funding was provided by the Royal Society of New Zealand Marsden Fund (16-UOO-045) and the University of Otago.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Royal Society of New Zealand Marsden Fund [Grant Number 16-UOO-045].